1 Comparison of Transform Coding Techniques for Two- Dimensional Arbitrarily-Shaped Images 1

Abstract

Envisioned advanced multimedia video services include arbitrarily-shaped (AS) image segments as well as regular rectangular images. Images segments of the TV weather reporter produced by the chromo-key technique [1] and image segments produced by video analysis and image segmentation[2,3,4] are typical examples of AS image segments. This paper explores efficient intraframe transform coding techniques for general two-dimensional (2D) AS image segments, treating the traditional rectangular images as a special case. In particular, we focus on transform coding of the partially-defined image blocks along the boundary of the AS image segments. We recognize two different approaches — the brute-force transform coding approach and the shape-adaptive transform coding approach. The former fills up the uncovered area with the optimal redundant data such that the resulting transform spectrum is compact. A simple but efficient mirror-image extension technique is proposed. Once augmented into full image blocks, these boundary blocks can be processed by traditional block-based transform techniques like the popular Discrete Cosine Transform (DCT). In the second approach, we change either the transform basis or the coefficient calculation process adaptively based on the shape of the A